For a moment that seemed to stretch infinitely, the chamber hung in perfect stillness. The hub's strange, living mechanisms froze mid-pulse. The fragmenting walls suspended between existence and dissolution. Even Bruce and Nathaniel appeared caught in amber, their expressions fixed in shock.
Only Mishka and the impossible, younger version of her father remained animated in the frozen tableau.
"Dad?" she whispered, her voice sounding hollow in the suspended space.
He stepped forward, each movement creating ripples in the air as if he were walking through invisible water. The lab coat he wore was pristine, exactly as it appeared in photos from Catherine's lab—the day of the accident.
"Not exactly," he said. His voice carried the familiar timbre of her father's, but with an underlying resonance that vibrated in her bones. "I've borrowed this form because it's one you'll listen to."
Mishka gripped the disk tighter. "You're one of them. The frequencies."